Who He Is
by fiendofspace
Summary: It's midsummer, and you're sick and tired of working your boring job in this impossible heat. Things change for the better when someone you've never seen before comes in and tells you that he can help. Rated T for language. Request from tumblr user choi-minkii.


It's midsummer, and the heat is unbearable.

Every day when you wake up at 8 AM to go to work, it's already seventy degrees. Today isn't any different. After you drag yourself out of bed you immediately close the window against the awful weather. You'd been taking to sleeping with it open because it was so damn hot out all day, and the only solace came with the cool breeze at night. It didn't help that your air conditioner had broken down. You'd only been living without it for a few days, but your outlook on life had already become more cynical. At least you know that if it gets too hot during work, you can lean over the ice cream bins to cool down.

By the time you get to work, the temperature has crept to over eighty degrees. You contemplate how nice it would be if the temperature kept growing and you burned up and died. At least you wouldn't be stuck working a shitty summer job to pay for college.

You spend the first hour in a daze, filling iced coffees and scooping ice cream as well as leaning over the ice cream bins as often as possible. You glare whenever someone orders a hot drink despite the weather. Those people just want to watch the world burn. There are so many idiots in this town.

You pay absolutely no attention to any of the patrons. After the first few hours, however, one of them catches your eye. He's tall, about your age, and has slicked-back brown hair with an obnoxious blonde streak; he's wearing a long-sleeved jacket and a scarf, as well as thick-framed glasses without lenses. What an ignorant prick. It's far too warm for scarves, he must know that, and it makes you agitated just looking at him.

"One caramel mocha," he tells you in a slightly accented voice.

You raise your eyebrows. "Iced?" you ask. Only an idiot would order hot coffee while wearing a coat and scarf in what was turning out to be ninety-degree weather.

He glances up at the menu above your head. "No, hot."

You grimace, ringing up the purchase and mixing the coffee. "Isn't it a little warm to be drinking hot coffee?" you ask with only a hint of attitude as you take the five-dollar bill that he hands you.

"Not for me," he says, taking the coffee from you. "I know a place."

"You 'know a place,'" you repeat hollowly, handing him change for the bill with which he paid.

"I do," he responds, taking the change and replacing it back in his wallet with some difficulty. "A place where I need this scarf and jacket, despite the weather."

Your gaze flicks back to the ice cream bins, your only source of relief that you know that you will lose when your shift ends in ten minutes. After this, the only thing that you have to look forward to is going back to your sweltering apartment and pining for your dead air conditioner. Cautiously, you look back at the stranger. "What is this place you're talking about? Must be pretty cold for you to be wearing things like that."

He grins. "I can show you, if you like."

"Fuck no. I don't even know your name." As nice as going somewhere where the temperature was under ninety degrees sounded, you weren't about to walk off to an undisclosed location with a perfect stranger.

"Eridan Ampora," he says, extending a hand out towards you.

You shake his hand. "Karkat Vantas." Quickly, you glance at the clock, then back to Eridan. He's looking at you expectantly. Somehow, you get the feeling that you don't need to be wary of him. And god, is it hot in this shop. "My shift ends in ten minutes."

He grins at you again. "Alright. I'll be here."

The last ten minutes of your shift pass by at snail speed. You can't keep your eyes off of Eridan, who is sitting at a table reading a newspaper, and you hope that he doesn't feel your eyes on him as you serve the rest of the customers. By the time someone arrives to take over, you're more than ready to leave.

Eridan sees your coworker walk in, and he gets up and meets you at the counter. "Two Italian sodas, please," he says, putting another bill on the countertop.

"Two?" you reply, punching in the order on the cash register. "What flavors?"

"One raspberry, and the other whatever flavor is your favorite."

You blink a few times too many. No one has ever actually bought you something while you were at work before. You take the bill and give Eridan his change, an embarrassing smirk on your face as you mix one raspberry and one strawberry Italian soda. It feels like a movie; a random stranger came into your place of work, bought you a drink, and promised to take you somewhere with him.

When you put it that way, it sounds sketchy as hell.

You bring the drinks back to Eridan after punching your timecard. He's no longer wearing his jacket or his scarf. Good to know that he's human and not some weirdo unaffected by the sun.

"How far away is this place?" you ask, sipping your Italian soda as you walk out the front door of the shop and into the blinding sunlight.

"Obviously not far, because I walked to the shop you work at for coffee." He glances at you with a sort of side-grin. "It's not anywhere weird, don't worry. I'm overseein a project for a friend, and we're goin to the place I'm supposed to keep an eye on."

"Sounds ridiculously shady," you say. You're not sure what type of project this guy is overseeing, but you know you're about to find out.

The two of you keep walking, Eridan slightly ahead of you. The sun is so damn hot that you step in the shade of trees that you're passing whenever you can. However, the palm trees that are so numerous in this town don't offer much shade. The path that the two of you are taking lies right on the beach, and the white sand nearby reflects the sunlight directly into your eyes. It's so damn bright that you have to squint, relying on Eridan's vague outline to lead you. Thankfully, Eridan soon takes a side road away from the beach. You blink furiously, adjusting your eyes as you silently curse everything about this town. You approach a large, warehouse-looking building, and Eridan opens the door and enters. Cautiously, you follow him.

The change is immediate. It's much darker in the large room you have just entered, and the temperature is suddenly so cold that you can see your breath come out in short clouds before you. You stop for a moment, allowing your eyes to adjust to the sudden darkness.

"Come on, Karkat, I need to get back to my post," says Eridan, beckoning for you to follow him.

You start walking again, hearing the sounds of mechanical grinding and what sounds like the breaking of rocks. There's some sort of commotion going on nearby, which is where Eridan is headed. As you near the small group, you realize what the commotion is about.

"Eridan, who the hell needs this many ice sculptures?" you ask, staring perplexedly at the workers huddled with power tools around huge blocks of ice. "In the middle of this awful heat, too? Wont they just melt?"

He laughs airily. "A friend of mine is throwin a huge party tonight, and he asked me to oversee the production of these things. Good thing, too, because this room has too be kept at under thirty-two degrees at all times today. It's so goddammned hot out that it's perfect. The party's this evenin, so we don't have to worry about them meltin."

You pull up a chair and sit down, cupping your Italian soda in your hands. This definitely beats leaning over the ice cream bins in terms of comfort any day. The air is so cold, and it's the best you've felt all week. Warm weather just makes you irritable.

Eridan pulls up a chair and sits next to you. The two of you talk for a while, just useless small-talk; however, you find yourself perceiving Eridan as an interesting character and being genuinely interested in what he has to say. Which is a first. You aren't exactly a social person. It's strange, but you find yourself actually leaning towards liking him: you soon find that he's snarky and sarcastic and not afraid to be mean, which surprisingly doesn't bother you. On the contrary, it reminds you of yourself. The small-talk turns to banter, which in turn becomes a playful argument.

You're now so invested in the conversation that you don't realize just how damn cold it is in this room. When you finally notice that your nose and fingers are losing all feeling and that Eridan has once again donned his jacket and scarf, you decide that maybe the warmth outside wouldn't be too bad after all. Eridan's developed a slight stutter, which you've snarkily commented on once or twice, but now you realize that it's probably because he's freezing. You're freezing. It's better than the obnoxious, constant heat outside, of course, but you're only wearing jeans and a tee-shirt.

"God, it's cold in here," you say through slightly chattering teeth.

"Now you see w-why I w-wanted hot coffee," he replies.

"Yeah. I was an idiot."

"Don't w-worry about it." He bites his lip, looking over at the door that leads back into the sunlight. "W-want to go outside for a bit? It gets so cold in here, that's w-why I w-went to the cafe in the first place. You need a break after a w-while."

"Better than freezing in here," you agree as you stand and extend a hand to pull Eridan up. The two of you head back outside, each of you holding onto your respective Italian sodas that remained relatively untouched inside the warehouse. At least they're still cold if you needed it later, and the ice is still frozen.

The two of you squint against the blinding sunlight as you leave the building. The heat hits you like a shock wave, but for once, you're glad to feel it. It feels nice after the stark contrast of the icy room.

"Where are the fuck are we even going?" you ask.

"Beach, maybe?"

You sigh loudly, making sure that he hears you. "Alright. Fine, I guess."

"W-well, w-where else are w-we supposed to go? There's nothin else to do in this tow-wn."

You laugh a little at the fact that he still has that useless stutter from the cold as you follow him back down the path to the beach. Once you arrive, you sit beneath a large umbrella at a wooden picnic table in the sand. Although you live practically on the beach, you never really pay much attention to it. During school you're constantly studying, and during the summer you're working and spending too much time cursing the weather to notice anything else. Now you see that the ocean is the truest shade of blue that you have ever seen and, even though the water is ridiculously cold, there are still a few people splashing around in the waves.

"So," starts Eridan. "What is a guy as irritable as you doin workin a minimum-wage job all summer?"

You grumble audibly, shifting so that you're completely in the shade of the umbrella. "College funds. I'm broke."

He's quiet for a minute, a slight smirk on his face. "I guess I could help with that," he says finally. "Tuition, I mean."

You glare at him. "What, I only just met you an hour ago and now you're trying to pay for my education?! Gog, if you're going to committ to something like that then at least take me on a date first." Then bitterly, you add, "idiot."

"I thought we were on a date right now," he says, looking out over the beach towards the ocean.

You... Have nothing suitable to say to that. "Uh..." you manage. "Eridan, I'm not gay..."

He doesn't seem fazed. "I never said you were," he says, not breaking his gaze from the horizon.

You squint, not only from the brightness but from confusion as well this time. You can stand Eridan, of course, but... But what? From what you'd seen so far, he was tolerable. A total asshat with a slight inferiority complex, yes, but tolerable. Which is more than you can say for pretty much everyone else you know. As a rule, you stay away from people. But somehow, Eridan was different. He had things to say that you actually felt like listening to, even if it was just to squash his opinion on something or to make a snide comment. And you could see yourself wanting to see him again.

After your ridiculously long internal monologue, you make up your mind on how you want to play things out. "So..." you begin, staring at the sand below you as you trace patternless lines through it with the toe of your shoe. "Is this a date then?"

He smirks once more. "I'd like to believe so."

Upsettingly, you find yourself grinning. "Is this going to be a reoccurring thing?"

His gaze breaks away from the horizon, and he turns his attention directly towards you. "If you want."

You nod, crossing your arms. "You're an ignorant asshole, but you're better than all the other idiots around this godforsaken town."

"Better than nothin," he says. He quickly glances at his watch, than stands. "I need to be goin over to the party to help set up now. Do you work tomorrow?"

"Yeah. Same time."

He smiles, a genuine smile this time. "I'll see you then, Karkat Vantas."

And with that, he turns and continues up the path, his dark jacket slung over his shoulder. You watch him go, mixed feelings churning inside of you. You want answers to them but you know that they will come when the time is right, so you gently push the questions into the back of your mind as you watch Eridan retreat.

Who even was Eridan? He said he'd come see you after your shift tomorrow.

You guess you'll just have to find out exactly who he is, little by little. And, you find yourself thinking, that's completely okay.

* * *

**Thank you very much for reading! **

**This was a fanfic request from tumblr user choi-minkii. **

**I'm sorry this is so long! I couldn't find an ending so it just kept going :/ **

**Reviews always appreciated! Thank you ~ **

**- fiendofspace**


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